With All Our Prayers: Walking with God through the Christian Year

Summary

A resource for both corporate worship and personal devotion, With All Our Prayers invites readers to pray, think, and live into God’s purpose for the world and for their own lives. Written by a longtime Presbyterian pastor, the beautiful prayers in this book are theologically grounded in God’s steadfast love and invincible grace and contain traditional elements of adoration, confession, thanksgiving, petition, and intercession.

In this helpful volume church leaders will find prayers ordered around the liturgical calendar with themes appropriate to the seasons of the church year. Individuals and prayer groups will find guidance in praying for church and world, in interceding on behalf of strangers and enemies as well as loved ones and friends.

I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, thankful for your partnership in the gospel . . . And I am sure that God who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

(Phil. 1:3-6, RSV)

Contents

Cover

Preface

Introduction: With All Our Prayers

I Am

And His Name Shall Be Called Emmanuel, God with Us

Good News of Great Joy . . . to All People

The Beyond in the Midst of Life

And the Word Became Flesh

and Dwelt among Us

Mine Eyes Have Seen Thy Salvation

The Light of the World

Prayers from Deep Within

Thou Dost Beset Me Behind and Before

Grace to Help in Time of Need

The Gift of Faith

Our Maker and Keeper

Blessed Is He Who Comes

in the Name of the Lord

The New Covenant

For Us

The Risen Lord

God’s Purpose in Us

Praying with the Bible

Prayers for the Children of God

Risen, Ascended, Reigning

The Fruit of the Spirit

The Faithfulness of God

We Believe; Help Our Unbelief

Prayers for the Common Life

The Proper Place of Fear

Let Us Worship God

For Those at Life’s Breaking Places

Chosen before the Foundation

of the World

My People Whom I Formed and Made

Be Not Afraid

World Communion Sunday

The Word of God

Thou Restoreth My Soul

A Mighty Fortress Is Our God

A Great Cloud of Witnesses

On Holding Things Together

A Thanksgiving Prayer

A Funeral Prayer of

Thanksgiving and Intercession

Preface

The traditional biblical teaching that human beings are created in the image of God is rooted in, and is witness to, the unique relationship God has established with humanity. Theologians and others have long sought to identify some particular attribute or quality humans possess as that which constitutes God’s image in us; for example: reason, imagination, the capacity for self-transcendence whereby we are able to regard ourselves as objects, to observe and to judge ourselves.

The book of Genesis, however, seems to say that the image of God is not anything human beings possess. Rather, it rests solely upon what God decides about us, and what God does with and for us. In these profound stories of human origin and purpose, God speaks personally to the human creatures, establishing with them a relationship unlike any other. Addressed by God’s word of creation and command, we are called to respond, to answer. Human beings are the praying animals (Robert Jenson). Made in the image of God, we are creatures who pray.

Most of the prayers in this collection were offered during worship at Covenant Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. As Prayers of the People, or pastoral prayers, they contain the traditional elements of adoration, confession, thanksgiving, intercession (prayers for others and for the world), and petition (prayers for ourselves). Additionally, these prayers focus somewhat more intentionally on issues of faith, and on pastoral situations in a congregation, in a community, and in the lives of individuals and families. They are intended to invite all readers — whether pastors, churches, small groups, or individuals — to take an intentional journey with God through the Christian year.

I am deeply grateful for the faith of the women and men, the youth and children in four congregations whom it has been my privilege to serve as pastor. They have prayed for me, and have helped me to pray with and for them.

Three treasured friends are due special thanks: Dean K. Thompson, fellow laborer in the vineyard of parish ministry and former president of Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, whose initiative and encouragement led to the publication of this volume; Sally Graves, for her careful preparation of this manuscript, her helpful suggestions along the way, and her competence, creativity, good cheer, and patience throughout the process; and Martha Isaacs, for her thoughtful reading of these prayers with a worshiper’s eye and ear.

John B. Rogers Jr.

Introduction: With All Our Prayers

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, let us pray: We come to you in prayer, Eternal God, able to do so because you have first come to us, and daring to do so because, having created us for yourself, claimed us for your own possession, and called us to be your covenant people, you have made the gift of prayer a defining mark of our life with you. You have revealed to us your name so that we know to whom we pray. You have called us by name so that we may pray with confidence that we are known of you and that we matter to you both presently and ultimately. Just so do our prayers express our faith born of your faithfulness. Just so are they our trusting words in answer to your sovereign Word uttered from the foundation of the world, living and active to accomplish your promised salvation and to bear your righteous command, and incarnate in Jesus Christ our Lord. By his grace, and in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, our lives are anchored in your love and hidden securely in your own triune life. Wherefore we come to you with all our prayers.

Amen.

I Am

Advent

(The prayer begins with a period of silence.)

Let us pray: Eternal God, before we speak, even in prayer, we must listen. We must listen for you to break the silence of eternity, for you to speak from beyond us a word of your presence with us and of our nearness to you. We remember that the universe exists because you spoke it into being, saying, Let there be light, order, heavens and earth . . . and it was so. We remember that we are because you created us male and female in your image. We remember that from of old you told us your name: I Am . . . I Am Who I Will Be . . . I Am The One Who Will Be Present With You, For You, Among You As God. Your name is your promise — your Word that makes room in your life for us. And now, on the threshold of Advent, we would prepare our hearts and our homes for the coming of him who bears your name, who is your promise in person, your Word made flesh — even Jesus Christ our Lord.

We are grateful, O God, for all that Christ’s coming reveals to us about you, about this world, about ourselves. We give thanks that to know Jesus Christ, dwelling among us full of grace and truth, is to know you, your mind toward us, your love of us, your will for us.

As we enter upon this Advent season, help us to welcome and not resist Christ’s coming, to prepare and not to impede his way toward and among us. Let it not be:

that we know the burden of our sin, but do not greet our Savior;

that we nurture our resentments and enmities, but fail to welcome the Prince of Peace who gives us the ministry of reconciliation;

that we remain prisoners of loneliness while he stands at the door whose name is Emmanuel — God with us;

that we continue in discouragement and dark despair when the light of the world has come that no darkness can withstand;

that we so quickly claim Christ to bless our small plans and priorities while we fail to discern in him your larger purpose for the world;

that we pervert the Christmas message to a word of judgment while we are deaf to the angels’ song: good news of great joy to all people.

How then do we make ready for Christ’s coming, O God? We could pray for our world, that suspicion, hatred, and violence might be overcome by peace and good will; and we could pledge ourselves to be instruments to that end. We could pray for our nation, that those who govern and enact laws might have a heart for justice and compassion and wise government that overrides personal ambition and party interests; and we could become such citizens ourselves. We could pray for our city, that people of faith